by Anthony James Joes
Lexington, Kt.: University Press of Kentucky, 2000. Pp. xiv, 418.
Maps, notes, biblio., index. $30.00. ISBN:0-8131-2181-7
Billed as explaining “How America wages guerrilla wars,” this volume is in fact rather disappointing. The overall treatment is not very sophisticated. Moreover, it is quite uneven. There is no coverage of the colonial wars, nor of the Indian Wars, nor anything about guerrilla and counter-guerrilla operations during the War of 1812, the Mexican War, and the Philippines in World War II. Indeed, a great deal of space is devoted to guerrilla wars in which the U.S., though it did play a role, did not fight: Greece, Huks, El Salvador, and Afghanistan. Although at times the author has some useful insights, the work has too many shortcomings to be recommended to anyone but the most serious student of irregular warfare.